


that bittersweet creature against which nothing can be done

by Coruscant



Category: The Old Guard (Movie 2020)
Genre: Angst, Drowning, F/F, Hanahaki Disease, Hurt/Comfort, Reunions, Survivor Guilt, Temporary Character Death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-09
Updated: 2020-10-09
Packaged: 2021-03-08 02:53:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,705
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26918413
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Coruscant/pseuds/Coruscant
Summary: Since losing Quynh to the ocean, Andy has died of the Hanahaki disease one hundred and fifty six times. After Merrick, the hundred and fifty seventh will be the one that kills her.
Relationships: Andy | Andromache of Scythia/Quynh | Noriko
Comments: 14
Kudos: 131





	that bittersweet creature against which nothing can be done

**Author's Note:**

> Is this more Andy/Quynh angst? Yes. Will I be writing variations on this theme until the heat death of the universe? Also yes.
> 
> For the purposes of this fic, this is how the Hanahaki disease works. I'm aware the actual details are probably less than correct.

It took her a while to realise, but in her defence, she wasn’t used to death being permanent. It wasn’t until two weeks after Booker had betrayed them – after the church, after Merrick – that she finally realised, coughing up bloodstained camellias at two in the morning. She was gathering up the petals, idly wondering how much they could trust Copley, when she thought, _I wonder how long it will take to kill me this time?_ She went to throw the petals away, and then froze, her gaze caught on the flowers in her hands.

This time, she wouldn’t wake up.

She strode into the room Joe and Nicky were sharing without knocking. Both of them jerked awake, Nicky bolting upright with a knife in his hand. He caught sight of her and squinted, his shoulders relaxing. “Andy?” he asked, lowering the knife. “Is something wrong?” Joe sat up next to him, rubbing at his forehead.

“We have a problem,” she said. Her voice sounded high and strained and not like herself at all. She flicked on the light switch and held up her handful of bloody flowers.

It took them a moment. And then Joe said, “No. _No._ ” He reached out and grabbed Nicky’s shoulders to hold himself steady, and Andy met his stricken gaze.

“Yeah.” Her mouth twisted into a bitter smile. “We’ve got less time than we thought.”

\--

It was Yusuf that noticed. Nicolò was the one they were relying on to get information from the sailors and organise passage on ships – Yusuf was too foreign, and Andromache too grief-stricken – he was away too often. Yusuf stayed with her, and she knew it was because they didn’t want to leave her on her own; didn’t trust her to be able to look after herself. And really, they were right, because Yusuf noticed even before she did.

They were sat in the small, dark rooms they were renting, waiting for Nicolò to return, and Andromache started coughing. It felt like there was something in her throat that she couldn’t get out. Yusuf paused in his drawing, and she felt his attention on her.

“I’m fine,” she muttered, getting herself a glass of water. After a few sips, the urge to cough subsided, but Yusuf was still watching her worriedly. “It’s probably the mildew,” she said, and thought nothing more of it.

The next time was when they were on the ship Nicolò had managed to hire, but she had just drowned – of course she was coughing. “I’m fine,” she said in irritation, waving off Nicolò’s hands. He exchanged a glance with Yusuf.

“I’ll go down next,” he said firmly, taking the rope off of her. She growled at him, but there wasn’t any heat behind it. She was finding it hard to breathe for some reason.

She kept her gaze on the water – Quynh was down there somewhere – and started coughing again.

It happened again that evening – a coughing fit for no reason – and Yusuf said, cautiously, “Do you feel well, Andromache?”

“I feel fine,” she said hoarsely. “It’s just the sea air.”

“You’ve been coughing a lot recently,” he said, and Nicolò stopped preparing the meal he was cooking, and turned to look at them.

“We can’t get ill,” Andromache reminded him, feeling slightly uneasy now herself.

“I know,” he replied, “I know.” But he still looked worried.

Two weeks later, she woke up from a dream of Quynh, and there was something caught in her throat. She bent over, coughing, thinking _but we can’t get sick, we don’t get sick, what –_

Yusuf and Nicolò had hurried to her side, and she waved them off, finally managing to cough up whatever she was choking on. A single blue petal dropped into her hand. She stared at it, and then looked up at Yusuf and Nicolò. They looked back at her, panicked.

“Andromache,” Nicolò said softly, “what’s going on?”

Andromache rolled the petal between her fingers. “I think–” she paused. “I think I know what this is.” It had been so long ago that she’d heard of it, before she’d even met Quynh. But wasn’t it supposed to be different? “I heard a story,” she said, still looking at the petal, “a long time ago, about a disease that made flowers grow in your lungs. It was a myth – some god or other.” She shrugged dismissively. “I didn’t think it was true.”

“A disease?” Yusuf asked, stricken. “But we – we can’t get sick. You said so yourself. Does this – does this mean–”

“I don’t think it’s that sort of disease,” Andromache replied, but she reached for a knife anyway. A quick cut across her palm later, and they knew she was still immortal.

They were silent as they watched the wound heal. “But if you’re still healing,” Nicolò said, “how can you be sick?”

Andromache returned her gaze to the flower petal, and for a moment she felt as though the weight of the sea was crushing her. “Quynh,” she said quietly. She took a deep breath and looked up to meet Yusuf and Nicolò’s eyes. “The disease – I can’t remember what it’s called in this language – it was supposed to be if you were in love, and it wasn’t returned. The only way to cure it was to confess your love to the one you loved, and have them return it.”

There was a long silence. Andromache closed her fist around the petal. “But Quynh loves you in return,” Nicolò said quietly.

“Does she?” Andromache asked. “Even now?” She shook her head. “It doesn’t matter anyway,” she said bleakly. Quynh was still stuck under the sea, and it seemed as if Andromache would be dying with her.

\--

The flowers grew over the years. There was an almost constant pain in her lungs, a feeling of something lodged in her throat, a constant reminder of what she had lost. It was usually worse after dreaming of Quynh. Dying seemed to reset it – flowers turning back into pain, then coughs, then petals again. It was a slow way to die. She’d waited, once, after they’d stopped looking for Quynh, and it had taken two years for it to kill her. Once they started their missions again, she normally died more often than that, so the slowly growing flowers didn’t kill her often. But they were constantly there; a pain in her chest, shortness of breath, coughs. It didn’t slow her down too much when she was fighting, but she normally spent several nights afterwards coughing up petals.

She’d died by choking on flowers ten times when they gave up searching for Quynh.

When they met Sébastien, she’d died from it seventy-six times. He mentioned his dreams, and she spent half the night throwing up blood-stained flowers. _Anemones,_ she noted. She threw them away, not bothering to look up the meaning – she could guess easily enough. She died of it again less than a month later.

\--

They sit around the rickety table in the safe house, staring at the blood stained petals in the middle of the table. “What flowers are they?” Nicky asked, sounding tense and tired. He was sitting as close to Joe as he could get, leaning forwards with his elbows on the table. Joe was leaning back in his seat and had a hand on Nicky’s back.

“Pink camellias,” Andy answered automatically. In the beginning, she hadn’t cared what flowers they were, but at some point in the 19th century, she’d picked up a book about the language of flowers. She never had worked out why the flowers growing in her lungs seemed to match the language made up after she’d contracted the disease – perhaps it was her knowledge of the language, and what certain flowers meant, that influenced the ones that were growing. What she did know was that the first petals she’d coughed up had been sea-blue, and as dark as Quynh’s hair, and the brilliant red of her favourite colour, and the ones she coughed up now were anemones and camellias, begonias and belladonnas, pink and red carnations, and more than anything else, forget-me-nots.

The silence stretched on.

“How long do you have?” Nile asked finally. They all turned to look at her.

“Hard to tell,” Andy answered. “A few months maybe. A year. No longer than that.” Her right hand was clutched around her necklace.

“Isn’t there a cure?” Nile asked, frowning. “I’m sure I heard–”

“No,” Andy said sharply, but she was looking at Nicky and Joe, not Nile. “We’ve had this discussion before,” she said, “and my answer stays the same.”

“But you won’t come back this time,” Nicky pressed. “You’ll die forever.”

“What’s this cure, and what’s wrong with it?” Nile broke in, looking between them all.

Andy pressed her lips together and looked down at the petals on the table. Nicky sighed. “Surgery,” he said quietly. “You can surgically remove the flowers. But it takes the love as well.”

“And it doesn’t work,” Andy said in irritation. “We tried it once,” she said to Nile, her hands clenching slightly at the memory, “and they just grew back.”

“But that was because you were immortal,” Joe said. His hand was still stretched across Nicky’s back, his other in a clenched fist on his knee. “Now they might not.”

“It’s a moot point anyway,” Andy said, “because I’m not doing it.”

Nile, Nicky, and Joe all looked at each other. “Andy,” Joe began, softly, “we could at least try.”

“No,” Andy said firmly, pressing her hands into fists to hide the way they were shaking. “What would it gain me, anyway? I could die on a mission tomorrow. And even if I do die of old age, how long would that take? Fifty years?” She shook her head. “It’s not worth losing Quynh.” Her gaze dropped back to the flowers on the table – this one last connection that she had with Quynh.

“Have you asked a doctor about it?” Nile asked. “A modern one, I mean. Maybe there’s something we can do to slow it down.” She shrugged. “Better than nothing, right?”

Andy met Joe and Nicky’s eyes. She’d give almost anything to not have to put them through watching her die. Anything else, even. But not this. “We can look into it,” she allowed.

\--

The doctor Copley had found had given her a box of pills. “They’re like anti-depressants,” she’d said, “and they seem to slow the disease a little. But they don’t cure it.” Andy had nodded, refused her offer of surgery, and reluctantly resigned herself to taking the medicine. It did seem to make it easier to breathe, which she was grudgingly grateful for, but she kept coughing up petals – marigolds, purple hyacinths, dark red roses.

Joe and Nicky had put a halt to missions, and she couldn’t blame them. It was one thing to fight even while being mortal – it was another when she was more of a liability than not.

It was six months in that Booker called. They all went quiet as the ringtone rang out. Andy sighed and reached for it, stepping outside and answering it. She didn’t even manage to say anything before Booker said desperately, “Tell me she’s not died from that stupid fucking flower disease yet.”

Andy couldn’t help laughing. “Only one hundred and fifty six times so far,” she said dryly, and heard his sigh of relief.

“I didn’t even think,” he said, his voice choked.

“Me neither,” she said quietly, staring out at the blackened landscape.

There was silence for a long moment, and then Booker said, “How long do you have?”

Andy sighed. “Doc says about a year, if I keep taking the medicine, and stop high-energy sports.”

“Is that what you’re calling it?” Booker said. There was silence again, and then he said, “So no missions?”

“No,” Andy agreed. “Even if I was willing to risk it, I’m slowing down. I’d only be a liability for the others.”

Booker made a vague noise of agreement, and then said hesitantly, “What about…searching?” There was a slight emphasis on the word that they only ever used to refer to her search for Quynh. “I mean, if you told her–”

“I can’t dive anymore,” Andy said, interrupting. “The kind of depths we’re going to, I wouldn’t be able to live through it.” She swallowed sharply. “Copley said something about a new technology that he’s going to try getting his hands on, but–” She shrugged helplessly. “That’s military tech. We’d have to steal it, and we all know how that goes.”

Booker gave a ragged laugh. “Oh yeah,” he said, “not doing that again.”

Andy smiled briefly, but her heart was aching and a sharp spasm of pain went through her lungs. “Fuck,” she muttered. “Give me a sec–” Moving the phone away from her ear she turned her head and coughed and coughed, her chest aching, spitting out a few rose petals.

“Damn, boss,” Booker said quietly. “It’s that bad?” All the strained humour had drained out of his voice, and now he just sounded tired.

“Yeah,” Andy said quietly. She tucked the petals into her pocket – she was gaining a collection.

“Have–” He paused. “I guess Nicky and Joe already brought up surgery?”

“They did,” Andy answered, letting her tone tell him what she thought of it.

“Ah. I see your opinion’s not changed.” She almost smiled at his dry delivery.

“If you could get rid of your grief – your love for your family – would you?” she challenged.

“Ouch,” Booker said, laughing again. “You always know how to hit where it hurts, huh?” He sighed, and then said, “My grief isn’t killing me, though.”

“Isn’t it?” Andy retorted.

“Ouch again,” Booker said, and Andy could hear the grin he was wearing. “I’ll stop before you draw blood.” Andy laughed shortly.

For a moment, all Andy could hear was him breathing on the other end of the phone. “It’s not worth her, Book,” she said quietly, honestly, and he made a pained noise.

“No, I know. I get it.” His voice was quiet and rough, and Andy closed her eyes briefly, wishing that she didn’t have to tell him this; that she had never gotten this disease. _While I’m at it why don’t I wish for Quynh to never have been taken,_ she thought bitterly, _and fucking world peace as well, why not?_

“I’ll come and see you,” she said, her voice hoarse, “before the end.”

He breathed in sharply, and was silent for a long time. “Thanks,” he said, his voice rough. “I didn’t know how to ask.”

Andy snorted. “Bit ridiculous to hold grudges now,” she said, and he huffed in agreement.

“For what it’s worth,” he said slowly, “I am sorry.”

Andy smiled, even though her heart was aching. “I forgave you as soon as you did it, Sébastien,” she said softly. “Who among us hasn’t wanted to end this at least once?”

“Yeah,” he said. He cleared his throat. “I guess I’ll be seeing you, then?”

“Give me a month to convince Nicky,” Andy said dryly, and he laughed again.

“I’ll see you in six then,” he said, and Andy laughed with him.

“See you, Book.”

“See you, boss.” The line went dead, and Andy sighed, tucking the phone back into her pocket.

\--

“It’s not grief,” she had said to him years ago, over a bottle of whiskey, just the two of them in Siberia somewhere. She had been dying, again. “If it was grief we’d all be spitting up petals.”

He had been silent for a moment, twisting the bottle in his hands. “I thought–” he’d begun. “My sons – I wondered–” He’d shaken his head, and Andy had sighed and leaned against his shoulder.

“Yusuf said the same thing,” she’d told him, “and Nicolò. Why my grief, and not theirs? Do they not suffer as much as I do? Is the weight of their grief not as strong?” She’d taken the bottle out of his hands and taken a swig, coughing. “But Quynh isn’t dead,” she’d said bleakly. “Just dying.”

“You’re still grieving though,” Booker had pointed out, trying to take the bottle back.

“Am I?” Andy had asked, moving the bottle out of his reach. “Can it be grief when she’s still alive?”

He’d shrugged, and leant over her and grabbed the bottle. “Does it matter? It’s still pain.” The way she had been half leaned against him she’d have had to get up to snatch it back, and that hadn’t seemed like a good idea with the way she’d been wheezing, so she hadn’t bothered.

She’d looked down at her hands, reached for the necklace Quynh had given her. “But it isn’t because you didn’t love them, Sébastien,” she’d said softly. “That’s not what it is.”

He’d looked down, away from her. “I know,” he’d said. “I know.”

Andy had taken the opportunity to steal the bottle back and take a large gulp, her chest aching, her lungs wheezing for air. “I once told Quynh I couldn’t live without her,” she’d said bleakly.

“What did she say to that?” Booker had asked quietly.

“She said, ‘You won’t have to.’” Andy had said, her eyes closed. “Turns out I was right.” And he’d reached over and pulled her into a hug, and held her while she slowly suffocated from the flowers and roots growing in her lungs.

That had been the hundred and first death.

\--

Andy sat in the garden and watched Nicky train Nile. She’d have done it herself, but Nicky had insisted. And he had a point – now she was mortal, not only was a training injury more serious, but now she would get breathless after a few minutes and have to pause to catch her breath.

She sighed, and tipped her head up to the sky. It was hard on Nile – she could see that. She’d expected Nile to take up her mantle once she was gone, when she’d thought about it before; to be the leader, the planner. To make up the heart of a new team, one that was Joe-and-Nicky-and-Nile (and Booker) instead of Joe-and-Nicky-and-Andy. But she’d thought she’d have more time. Now Nile would be left with a grieving Nicky and Joe and all the results of Booker’s treachery, only having been an immortal for a year (if they were lucky). That would be a tall order if she’d been immortal as long as Booker had.

She was pulled out of her thoughts by the sounds of training ending. Nicky clapped Nile on the shoulder and went into the house. Nile trudged over to Andy and collapsed next to her. “Are you sure you can’t take over?” she asked, groaning.

Andy laughed. “I’ve been told that I’m a terrible teacher,” she admitted.

“Yeah,” Nile grumbled, “but at least I could take you now.” She sat up, stretching. “Did Copley call earlier?”

Andy’s hands tightened around her phone. She nodded. “He thinks he can get a boat for us in a few months,” she said. Nile glanced at her, and then away again, and Andy knew what she wasn’t saying – that she probably didn’t have a few months left.

“Tell me about her?” Nile asked quietly.

Andy sighed, and smiled. “It took me a century to find her,” she said, “after we started dreaming of each other. I wasn’t sure if she was even real, at first.” She was silent again for a moment, remembering the sudden shock of that first dream. “She was dying, when we met. I found her in a desert.” She reached up to touch her necklace, gently. “She was the only person who could ever beat me in a fight. She was faster than you would believe.”

“Joe said she was a pit viper in a fight,” Nile said, and Andy laughed.

“The first time they sparred, she caught him by surprise and stabbed him,” she said, smiling fondly at the memory. “He’s called her a pit viper ever since.” The laugh turned into a cough halfway through, and she had to wait for it to subside before she could continue. “She was the one that taught Nicky how to use a bow, and they always argued whether the recurve bow or the crossbow was better. No one could best her at archery. Not even me.”

She fell silent again, and when she looked up, Nile was watching her. “If I don’t make it,” Andy said quietly, and then paused.

Nile reached out and put a hand on her arm. “I’ll look for her,” she promised. “I’ll look until I find her.”

\--

Andy woke from a dream of Quynh that she hadn’t had for centuries – no water, or drowning, no pain or fear. Just the two of them riding across an endless steppe, weapons on their backs. Quynh had looked at her and smiled; she had laughed; the stars had shone brightly above them.

She was coughing even before she woke up. She tried to get up and go outside quietly, but her normal stealth was interrupted by bouts of coughing. She sat down and took shallow breaths, tilting her head back to see the stars. That was a mistake – it sent her into another flurry of coughing.

There was the creak of a floorboard behind her, and then Joe settled down next to her. They sat in silence for a few moments.

“What if Quynh gets out?” Joe said quietly, a hand on her back. “What if she comes up to me in twenty years’ time and says, ‘where’s Andromache?’ Am I supposed to tell her that I let you die?”

Andy took a shaky breath, and coughed up a few more petals – marigolds. “What if she comes up to me in twenty years,” she said, “and I say, ‘who are you?’”

\--

Nile had woken up screaming, and Nicky had said, “Tell us,” and she had. She had told them about Quynh, and Andy had had to leave to cough up a whole bloom of anemones, her heart aching almost as much as her lungs, Nile’s words echoing in her ears.

\--

Joe drove her to Booker’s apartment. It was two months since he’d called her, and Joe still looked unhappy. Neither he nor Nicky had raised any objections to her visiting him, but she could tell that neither of them had forgiven him – a pretty big clue was the way they’d insisted that one of them drive her there, and that both of them stay somewhere nearby.

In truth, she was glad Joe had driven her. It was bad enough now that she couldn’t walk far without getting breathless, and her coughing fits were regular enough that any long-distance drive was a bad idea.

Andy grabbed her bag from the backseat. “Cheer up, Joe,” she said. “I hear Nile’s insisting you go to the Louvre later.”

Joe gave her a tight smile, and reached over to hug her. “Punch him one for me, boss,” he said.

Andy laughed and climbed out of the car, heading up to Booker’s apartment. She tried the door when she got there and found it locked. Booker normally left it open during the day, although knowing him he’d not gotten out of bed yet. Well, that was what you got when you decided to surprise him. She rolled her eyes and banged on the door. “Booker!” she shouted. “Open up!”

There was a crashing noise from inside the apartment. Glass? Was he drunk already? “Andy?” he shouted back.

“Who else?” she asked. “Come on, open this door.”

“Give me a second,” he shouted back, sounding panicked. Andy rolled her eyes – like she’d never seen him as a drunken mess before. There were a few more sounds, like he was trying to clean up, and then he said, “No! Don’t!” and –

The door opened –

And –

It wasn’t Booker.

Andy dropped her bag. She forgot how to breathe. Quynh was standing in front of her. “Andromache,” she said, and Andy had forgotten what her voice sounded like. “Do come in, won’t you? We have a lot to discuss.”

Andy stepped past the threshold in a daze. Her ears were ringing. She could barely feel the floor under her feet. For a moment she wondered if she was going to faint. Quynh shut the door behind her, and then turned to her. “Quynh,” she said, her voice cracking. Part of her wanted to turn and look for Booker, but nothing could have moved her attention away from Quynh in that moment.

“Don’t speak to me,” Quynh hissed, advancing on her. “Don’t you dare speak to me like you didn’t abandon me.”

Andy gasped for breath. Her lungs were aching. Quynh had backed her against a wall, all spitting fire and fury, and all Andy could see when she looked in her eyes was anger and hatred. “You left me,” Quynh said, her voice low. “You left me down there. _You stopped looking._ ”

“I’m sorry,” Andy said, helplessly.

“ _Sorry?_ ” Quynh repeated, incredulous.

“What else do you want me to say?” Andy asked quietly. Her lungs were aching and burning and she knew without being told that the amount of time she had left was dwindling by the second. “I have no defence.”

“You could have tried!” Quynh growled. “You could have searched! You could have found me!”

Andy turned her head and coughed harshly. “We tried,” she said, drawing in shallow breaths. “We tried.”

There was no love left in Quynh’s eyes as she raised a knife and rested the tip against Andy’s throat. “I should kill you a thousand times,” she said. “I should let you die and drown and suffer for five hundred years.”

Andy almost wanted to laugh. “I did,” she said, her voice croaking. “I am.” And then a coughing fit racked her and she almost doubled over from it. It dropped her to her knees as she gasped for breath, coughing up petal after petal. Eventually it eased, and left her crouched on the floor, struggling for breath, the flowers Quynh had been named for, bloodstained and wilting, covering the floor.

“It’s true,” Quynh said quietly, and Andy looked up and saw the look on her face – fear, regret, grief. She struck faster than Andy could stop in this state – not that she would anyway – and Andy could almost hear Joe telling Nile _she was a pit viper in a fight._ Her knife slashed across Andy’s cheek, opening a shallow cut that bled and bled and bled, and did not heal.

Quynh dropped her knife. “It’s true,” she said again, her voice wavering. “You are dying.”

“I am,” Andy said, her heart aching. She didn’t feel steady enough to stand, so she dropped backwards until she was sat on the floor, leaning against the wall. “If you want to see me suffer, you won’t have to wait long.”

Quynh just stared at her, helpless grief and rage warring on her face. Still keeping half an eye on her, Andy took the moment to glance around for Booker, and found him standing a few feet away, gun trained on Quynh. “You alright, boss?” he asked, neither his aim nor his gaze wavering.

“No,” Andy said. “Pass me some water, would you?” He hesitated for a moment, and Andy gentled her tone. “You can’t shoot her faster than she can stab me, Book,” she said, “and I’m dying anyway.”

He huffed, but lowered his gun, though he kept hold of it, and fetched a glass. Looking away from the spectacle of Booker trying to fill a glass of water one-handed while not looking, Andy let her gaze be drawn back to Quynh.

Quynh met her eyes, and seemed to be jolted out of whatever trance she’d been in. She moved forwards, dropped to her knees next to Andy, and took Andy’s face in her hands. Distantly, Andy heard Booker swear and the sound of glass shattering.

“You can’t be leaving me,” Quynh said tears glittering in her eyes, “Andromache, don’t leave me.”

Andy reached up, and placed her hand over Quynh’s. “I’m sorry,” she said helplessly. “If I knew how to stop it, I would.”

“You could get some fucking surgery,” Booker suggested, moving forwards slowly, one hand still holding his gun, the other holding a glass of water.

Quynh’s gaze snapped to him and then back to Andy, something like hope growing there. “No,” Andy said firmly. “I won’t forget you, Quynh.” She waved Booker away as he tried to give her the water.

“I will be right here,” Quynh said, “we can make new memories, Andromache.”

“No,” Andy said, shaking her head, reaching for Quynh, “no, Quynh, you don’t understand. It takes the love. You can’t get rid of the flowers without taking away the love.” She met Quynh’s eyes, her hands on Quynh’s shoulders, willing her to understand. Dimly, she was aware of Booker moving into the other room to give them some privacy. “I won’t live without loving you, Quynh,” she said, her voice thick with tears. “I can’t.”

“I won’t live without you, Andromache,” Quynh said, catching her hands and holding them tightly, a wild look in her eyes.

“You’ll have to lose me anyway,” Andy said, tears trickling down her cheeks. “I can’t heal anymore. What will it get us? Forty years? Fifty? It’s nothing.”

“It’s time I want,” Quynh said fiercely. “Nothing or not, I’ll take it. Love or not. I can love you enough for both of us.”

To Andy it felt like time had frozen. “What?” she said weakly, hiccupping on a sob. “You don’t love me.”

Quynh’s look turned into rage. “I – ! You! Of course I still love you, Andromache! How dare you!” She grabbed Andy’s shirt and hauled her closer. “You think five hundred years can change how I feel?” she hissed, low and menacing.

“But–” Andy shook her head. “I left you,” she said. “I gave up! I stopped looking, Quynh! I left you to drown and I–” She had to break off, tears choking her.

“You think that matters to me?” Quynh cried.

“I know it does!” Andy shouted back. “I wouldn’t be dying right now if you loved me, Quynh!” She paused, gasped in a ragged breath. “I wouldn’t have died so many times of this stupid fucking disease if you still loved me!”

Quynh abruptly let go of her, and Andy slumped back against the wall, breathing hard, one hand pressed to her aching chest. Booker was speaking in the other room, but his voice was just a buzz in Andy’s ears. Quynh was staring at her, her eyes wide and wet with tears.

“Andromache,” she said, “how could you think that?” She gently reached out and cupped Andy’s face in her hands, wiping away her tears. “All our years together,” she said softly, “everything we suffered, all the trials we overcame. I might be angry with you, but I still love you.”

Andy shook her head – in disbelief, in denial – and Quynh leant forwards and kissed her. Andy reached for her automatically with shaking hands, pulling Quynh as close as she could, letting the truth sink in that Quynh was here, and alive.

Quynh pulled away, and Andy took in a ragged breath, and stared at her. Stared at this woman she loved, this woman she knew better than anyone else, and saw love. Rage, yes, oceans of rage in her eyes, an anger born from suffering that would never dim, but love as well. Love, in the twitch of her lips, forgiveness in the gentle way she watched her, in the tears running down her cheeks, in the desperate way she clutched at Andy, knowing that soon she would have to let go forever.

Love, and forgiveness, and a second chance that Andy knew she did not deserve. “I wish I could give you another five hundred years,” she said, clinging to Quynh as tightly as Quynh was holding her, “another millennia. I wish I could stay by your side as long as you wanted.”

“You will,” Quynh said fiercely. “We will fix this, my heart.” She stood, dragging Andy with her, an iron resolve in her eyes, and turned to face Booker. He was stood in the kitchen, a phone to his ear.

“Drive faster, then!” he was saying. “Who cares about tickets, you know we won’t have to – hey!”

Quynh grabbed the phone from him, and held it in front of her. “Nicolò?” she said, frowning at it. “Yusuf?” Faint voices shouted from the phone and she squinted at it. “Can you hear me? How does this work?”

Andy leant against her, using Quynh to hold herself up. Her legs still felt weak. Booker glanced at her, concern on his face, and then did a double-take. She frowned. “Book?” she asked in concern, her voice still rasping and hoarse.

“Mon dieu,” he said, his voice wondrous, “Andy – the cut on your face. Quynh, look!” He grabbed Quynh’s arm and turned her.

“I am busy, Sébastien – Andromache!” She dropped the phone and reached out, brushing her fingers against Andy’s face.

“What?” Andy asked, frowning.

They both stared at her. “The cut on your face,” Booker said finally. “It’s healing.”

She reached up, reached for the bloody cut that Quynh’s knife had left, and found nothing but smooth, uninjured skin. She stared at the both of them, wordless, disbelieving.

Then Quynh lunged forwards and Andy lifted her arms and caught her as she had a hundred times before, and Quynh dropped kisses all over her face. Booker whooped with joy and grabbed both of them in a hug, laughing. Andy joined in, and for the first time in five hundred years, her lungs were clear of flowers.

Quynh pressed a kiss to her cheek where the cut had been. “I’m going to make your life a misery,” she promised, her eyes gleaming with tears, her smile wide. “You’re going to wish me back into the depths of the ocean before I’m done with you.”

Andy smiled back at her. “I look forwards to it,” she said, feeling as young as she had been when she’d first found Quynh, as though all the millennia between had never happened; as though she would never be alone again.

**Author's Note:**

> I've got no idea if the flower symbolism I'm using here is "correct" or not, but for the purposes of this fic it's good enough: Anemones – forsaken, begonias – beware, dark thoughts, belladonna – silence, bluebell – humility, constancy, pink camellias – longing, red carnations – heartache, purple hyacinth – sorrow, marigold – despair, grief, dark red rose – mourning


End file.
